City Novicehood

Jeremy Saunders

Something we have been batting around for a while, which we are going to do, is move from a guild novicehood system, to a city novicehood system. This is just in the planning stages, so we have not gone very far, but the basic ideas is this.

The main purpose is to have a larger draw of helpers online all the time. It is also possible for us to maintain specific newbie quests and tasks per org this way.

1. Remove the position and commands from guilds.

2. Add a city position to the cities.

3. People that have that position will be able to look at newbie score, commands, etc in order to help them.

4. Add city specific quests/tasks for each city.

City = Council as well.

Outside of that, we have done very little planning outside of batting the idea around. I am pretty sure we want to do it, however I would like some input from you guys before we really get going on it.

Thoughts? Ideas? Comments?

Aulani

I think it is a good idea, some of the Guilds are extremely small and thus not equipped well to help the novices that join them. (I wouldn't mind making a few comments on Guilds, but I'll keep to the topic at hand.)

Something that would concern me is giving the ability to look at commands, even just novice ones to the general populace. It could provide help, more likely it will cause gossip and ridicule.

It unfortunately would remove one of the more obvious ways for people to help out, get noticed and feel special within the Guilds themselves. Especially for those who are less combat centric.

You'll also be destroying the position for 18 Guilds and adding 6 City/Council positions to cover it. While I know exactly how I would change Cassius' position and keep him as a Secretary. (He's such a great help.) You're basicaly going to have 2-3 people in each city fighting for a position they already had, hurt feelings will abound all around. (Not that I think this should stop you from doing it, just a comment.)

I think the aides to this position need to have Novice Aide and not City Aide next to their name. So that novices can pick them out.

Please make it clear the cities cannot put unreasonable requests on novices before allowing them to progress. I love the quests and I've continued to use them within the Vindicators. (I remember how much we worked to implement the original ones in all the Guilds.) but there are still Guilds that want you to run around naked under the three moons and wait two weeks before writing an essay and doing an interview. And don't forget to deposit all that sweet gold you worked so hard to get. (Exaggerated, I know, but I think you get the point.) If that is carried over to the cities, you'll just be making it so that more people are miserable, rather then getting more helped.

This turned out a little longer then I expected. But I do hope it turns out well and is implemented nicely.

Khizan

This is something that should have been done a long time ago.

Another thing I'd like to see happen along this line is the removal of guild/profession affiliations. At this point, there's really no need for it at all.

Lalitana

This seems to be the next step in a trend to further reduce the power and influence of guilds.

I was going to make an argument about the need for novices to learn about their profession(s) from fellow guild members, but this doesn't prevent that from happening - and if handled properly, cuts the head off of the old-school novice mentality that just won't die.

I'd be concerned that some guilds would try to bring back the idea of being on probation (or just being flatly denied advancement) until you slay Hrimdeyr and write a poem about it in iambic pentameter, then cover all of Celidon in glitter.

Sarrius

Will this be closer to the collegium system in Lusternia, or the new system they're fooling around with in Aetolia?

Either way, I approve.

Selthis

With the profession changes, please just make every novice have every profession at tri inept  and make one of the first newbie tasks a question and answer session to help determine what class they want to play and then tailor the experience from there. Also, make the guild choice one of the later steps of the newbie experience, and encourage guilds to get the whole roleplaying thing as the focus.

There should be be no reason for apprenticeship really aside from very niche cases,  we've basically ensured that someone can get all the professions anyway. So why not just make it automatic if you're in a circle related org (city/council/guild) you automatically get all the professions associated with that circle.  I guess still  make people able to be apprenticed for the people who don't want  to join a guild or a city. 

But either way, I think this whole thing is a great idea and something I've been wanting to see for a while. Guilds should be about roleplay, not about profession.  

This will mean guilds need to be active and interesting to get people as members.

Edit: It will make guilds largely symbolic moreso than anything.  Also maybe once a person has achieved Master rank in their profession automatically gets  favoured to a voting rank. That way, I can either do all the work and be able to vote or  I can just learn out do it and no one can  hold voting hostage.   

Edit 2: Just remove probation from guilds totally. If you want to keep stuff secret, that is why there are clans.

Khizan

Lalitana said:
I was going to make an argument about the need for novices to learn about their profession(s) from fellow guild members

  This doesn't really apply anymore; in many cases, your guild members aren't using the professions associated with the guild, or they're using one of the guild's professions that has nothing to do with the guild's other professions and they know nothing about it. 

Sarrius

Selthis said:

Edit: It will make guilds largely symbolic moreso than anything.  Also maybe once a person has achieved Master rank in their profession automatically gets  favoured to a voting rank. That way, I can either do all the work and be able to vote or  I can just learn out do it and no one can  hold voting hostage.   

People still do this?

Selthis

Sarrius said:

People still do this?

I honestly don't know, but I figure its best to  cover the bases really. 

Jeremy Saunders

Thanks for the feedback thus far.

Dyrren

On the whole, I rather like it.  Personally, I'll be inviting kiddies to the arena so they can test out their skills as soon as they announce over CT.

I might ask that city novice aides be allowed into local novice areas to assist in guidance.

Also, I ask that HELP GUILDNOVICES <guild> get pointed out somewhere in the new system, so that guilds can properly communicate requirements outside of their GHELP files.

I don't like the added load to CT, but what else can you do with years of work to castrate guilds?

Lionas

Dyrren said:

I don't like the added load to CT, but what else can you do with years of work to castrate guilds?

I'm sure they'll add CNT.

Selthis

Dyrren said:

I don't like the added load to CT, but what else can you do with years of work to castrate guilds?

With the number of guilds doing stuff that deserves castration is it hard to understand why they'd want to eliminate  the crazy powertrips that some of the guilds have been on to make the game more approachable for new players?

Dyrren

Selthis said:

With the number of guilds doing stuff that deserves castration is it hard to understand why they'd want to eliminate  the crazy powertrips that some of the guilds have been on to make the game more approachable for new players?

Eh, I'm not against busting up incompetent systems.  Because they're incompetent.

However, any system can be incompetent, and to claim the entire system as inherently wrong denies the efforts of everyone who was able to pull it off right.  This change seems to be the next step in recreating the guild environment of the days of yore, only with cities and a bunch more shiny professions for you to get bored with.

Make no mistake, I'm good with the change.  It was necessary since guilds have been made largely irrelevant by removing any service they might provide.

Ahkan

The problem with guilds is that there is constant and inevitable turn over. 

Saboteurs were big time when the game opened. Now they're dead last. They're DOA. There are also people that play/have played this game that exist to kill guilds. Lorekeepers, Ansheri and the attempt at the Noctusari. There's also a culture of people who actively move into broken down guilds and take over so they can make a little club house for all of their friends, with little regard for the members. It's best if we move any sort of newbie raising away from this and put it where there's usually (hopefully) more over sight and 'good' involvement.

Aleutia

If we're essentially gutting guilds, I'd like to see more than one city rank added to the whole. Seven total feels low. I'm not saying give us twenty, but if we're going to see more people involved (hopefully) org-wise I think it would be nice to have a larger number.
(Plus I like brainstorming up ranks, shut up)

Labil

Aleutia is a bureaucrat at heart, but one of those rare breeds that are efficient.

Ambrose

I really like the idea of a city novice hood - I think it makes the game more approachable and tears down that internal conflict of a novice about who to serve more... Honestly, I think the guild system should die on some level. I don't think having different paths within a city is a bad idea (have your defenders, historians, teachers, etc.) and let those serve as 'guilds,' but let the current incarnation die. Maybe have the novice choose a guild once they graduate from novicehood or something along those lines? But having guilds loosely associated with cities where you have to split allegiance is a bad move. And regarding current head of novices losing their spots or whatnot - you aren't losing an influx of players in each city, so the workload remains the same... just consolidated into one organization... seems like having a few designated novice aide coordinators might not be a bad idea?

Aleutia

Random brain dumping:

- Remove professions listings in guilds, and throw them on CW
- Really I would just do away with guilds at this point but not my call
- I would add five ranks of guilds if we're going to strictly RP based: initiate, non-voting member, voting member, secretary, GM. To get kicked from non-voting to voting, base it on what @Selthis said, master of profession (1500 lessons in the profession now if I understand right? Once you hit 1500 lessons in the profession you are automatically promoted)
- Switch the intro and introduce the org first, and then the guild (But really I assume at this rate the intro would get rewritten all over again)
- Since guilds are going RP based, remove guild-health. It's a pointless mechanic of 'who can idle the longest' 99% of the time.
- Give specially privileged people in guilds access to guild mob shells. I know a lot of terrible can arise from this. A lot of awesome can too.
- In this vein let us cycle out mobs more easily in guilds to make them feel more lively

Belketh

Midkemia Online removed guild novicehood in favor of city novicehood and it worked greatly for them. There are far more people in each city than there are in any guild at any given time. I am currently going through novicehood here and the help I have received thus far has been fantastic, I thought I would just add that information.